Tuesday, April 15, 2014

A Baptism Date

Hey Mom!

Well, this week was really good and interesting. I will
start off withthe great news. Moritz, who was originally going to get
baptized onApril 26th, had to change his baptismal date. He requested to
bebaptized on May 11th (Mother's Day), and he asked that I would be
theone to baptize him. That means you guys get to be there too, so
itshould be a great experience! Moritz is really excited about
gettingbaptized.

Anyway, now to the recap of the week. We had P-day
on Monday with thePaderborn Elders who had overnighted with us because of
generalconference. We had a lot of fun. Elder Moore and I later had
mostlypaperwork to finish up in the apartment to get all of our records
inorder.

On Tuesday, the weather was really weird and made it
difficult to knowif we could go outside or not. It would start raining
really hard for5 or 10 minutes, and then get sunny again for another 5 or 10
minutes,and then the cycle would repeat itself. We took the opportunity
tocompletely finish some things in the apartment we had been putting
offbecause there were just some higher priority things we had
toaccomplish. It was kind of a slow day, but we got a lot of things
donethat we now don't have to keep putting off and make the
missionariesafter us do. We did at least have English class that night,
though.

We went by on a couple members on Wednesday, one of whom had
abirthday so we brought by some brownies. We later on had anappointment
with the Dietrichs, an active couple in the ward. They gotpretty excited
about missionary work seeing as Sister Dietrich has aless-active brother,
and his daughter is also less-active and has asemi-interested, nonmember
boyfriend. They said they were going to tryand make a little barbecue
get-together on the coming Saturday, so wewere excited for that.

On
Thursday, we had a lesson with a woman named Monica that we hadfound
contacting the previous week. She wants to give up smoking, sowe went
through the "Stop Smoking Program" that our mission has. Shealso showed
interest in our message, so we should be having a lessontomorrow with her
about the Gospel if all goes according to plan.Later that evening, we also
had a lesson with Moritz in Dortmund,followed by staying there with him for
institute. We talked about theGospel of Jesus Christ with him, and it was
pretty easy for him tounderstand and accept.

On Friday, Elder Moore
and I did our weekly planning session beforeheading to Dortmund for zone
training meeting. After the meeting, Istayed in Dortmund and went on a split
with Elder Clark, one of thezone leaders there. We did some home teaching
splits for a few hourswith a former German Elder who served in this mission.
It was kind ofcool talking to him. He trained Elder Fausnaught, my second
companionin the field.

There was a youth conference on Saturday that
missionaries werepermitted to visit if youth from their wards were going. We
got to go,and our part in the program was to help the youth give out
invitationsthey had created for the Easter Sunday service in Dortmund.
ElderMoore and I accompanied two Aaronic Priesthood holders in our
ward.They were noticeably scared talking to random people in public,
butthey did a good job. Upon returning from Dortmund, we had
thatbarbecue appointment with the Dietrichs and the others they
invited.It was a really good opportunity to get to know their friends
andrelatives a little better. We asked the one nonmember boyfriend of
theless-active girl if we could call him that week to try and set up
anappointment, and he said yes. We also shared a Mormon Message with
therest of them, and it seemed to be really helpful. the Dietrichs
werereally happy about how the activity went. Later on, we ended the
nightwith our usual appointment with Bruder Kramer.

Sunday was pretty
typical in terms of church services except that wewatched the last session
of General Conference for the last two hoursof church. Moritz came, and
after church, we had a short lesson withhim about preparation for baptism
and a few of the commandments. Hewas still really excited about his baptism,
and he came to instituteand church even though his girlfriend and her family
couldn't come. Heis way solid.

Yesterday, Elder Moore and I were in
Dortmund for a long time. ElderMoore had an interview with Pres. Schwartz,
and afterwards we had ameeting with Pres. Schwartz, the zone leaders, the
assistants, and thedistrict leaders in our zone to discuss the needs of the
districts andthe zone. When we got back to Hagen, we went to our bishop's
house forFHE.

I have my last interview with Pres. Schwartz today.
Normallyinterviews last for 10-20 minutes, but the last interview takes
aboutan hour. I have heard from other missionaries ending their
missionsthat Pres. Schwartz talks about marriage a lot, so this
willdefinitely be an interesting experience. Other than that, Elder
Mooreand I will have P-day for about the rest of the day since
yesterdaywas all meetings.